Are we all looking forward to David Lammy becoming PM?

[ProudAmberTurtle]

There's no way Starmer can survive this latest scandal.

Lord Mandelson failed his security vetting for the US ambassador job, but he still got the post anyway.

Starmer stood up in Parliament last September and insisted "full due process" was followed — three times.

He therefore either misled parliament and has to resign under the Ministerial Code, or his advisors have misled him and parliament, which is likely a criminal matter and suggests a level of almost unbelievable government incompetence or corruption.

What great things are you hoping this country will achieve under PM Lammy?

To be fair he would have to go a long way to be as dishonourable as Johnson!

Well the official Covid inquiry disagrees with you. It stated that if Johnson had closed down the country a week earlier, tens of thousands of lives would have been saved.

www.bma.org.uk/news-and-opinion/23-000-covid-deaths-could-have-been-avoided-with-earlier-lockdown-inquiry-finds

Sweden didn't and had less deaths per capita.

They shouldn't have locked down our children at all. That's was the most damaging thing relating to covid.

Not really. Keir is actually worse IMO and also a hypocrite which you can't accuse BJ of being.

You can't be lying if you don't know something. Lying is a deliberate action.

He either repeatedly said something that was unlikely to be true and didn't bother to find out if it was true.

Or knowingly said something that isn't true.

One is basically a lie with a lot of incompetence thrown in, the other is a lie.

Either way his position is untenable.

Of course he knew. He stood up in Parliament and said the procedure had been followed which he would definitely have checked. No one would have lied to him about that. And he told journalists that PM had passed vetting. Starmer is a lawyer. Its in his bones to have checked this. So he will have known that the security services didn't pass Mandelson for vetting. He just didn't want to have to U Turn on his appointment.

He'd better spill now...its always the cover up that gets them in the end.

Mandelson was appointed before vetting was concluded. Due process was followed is a lie.

I can.

BJ told everyone to stay in and wouldn't let people go to their loved ones' funerals whilst being aware of parties amongst the Conservative party staff. It was that hypocrisy that brought him down.

Well no, that isn't the only set of options.

At work, I rely on people providing me with information. If I'm not told about something and make a decision based on the information I have - I haven't lied and haven't not bothered to find out. People are assigned roles. If the PM is expected to do all the investigation himself, then it's pointless having people reporting to him isn't it.

Oh and he ate cake. Neither of which was a threat to national security.

Seems so tame compared to this Mandelson appointment....

So the issue isn't that the vetting decision was overturned, as revealed by the Guardian last night?

How bloody dare you trivialise something which deeply affected everyone bereaved during COVID. That disgusts me.

I think the chronology is that PM was appointed before vetting had concluded, he then failed vetting which should have led to the retraction of his appointment but someone "high up" over ruled that presumption and he was allowed to stay in place despite being a threat to national security. "Procedure" was therefore not followed

If you're the CEO of a company and:

50% of your staff lied to you so you misled your customers in a way that has caused serious reputational and financial damage, and

You and the other 50% didn't challenge them or notice

Then the only way to save that company is if you resign

Starmer is spinning so many tales and throwing people under the bus at pace but as @Pineneedlesincarpetsays the Mandelson appointment happened before vetting concluded. Before Olly Robbins was in the job even.

So when Starmer said in parliament all due process was followed it was a lie. And he can’t even put that on OR as he wasn’t in place yet.

Right, so that doesn't change whether or not Starmer knew does it? Or am I missing something. I've seen a lot of "he must have known". But no evidence that he did.

If he did, absolutely get rid.

Johnson was a risk to national security as FS, May didn't want to share documents and there was his drunken stint to Ledebev Sr Italian villa

Mandelson was to be a Trump whisperer.

Starmer was wrong to appoint him but at the time it was seen as a shrewd appointment by many in politics and the media

Anyway what about we finally go for 'chaos with Milliband'?

But if he thought due process was followed - what else would he have said?

You wouldn't just 'notice' someone had failed vetting though would you.

If you were CEO of a goldfish shop and your fish kept dying and you asked staff if the water was being changed and they were being fed - and they said yes, I'd except the CEO to query it.

If I'm the CEO of a school academy, and someone is appointed as a Teacher & I am told they have had the relevant checks, how and why would I 'notice' they haven't?

Why would he think it had? He’s blaming a person not even in the role at the time of the appointment.

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Presumably (he would claim) he would have asked someone whether procedure was followed as he is the Procedure Prime Minister. And then trustingly repeated what he was told in Parliament and told journalists that Mandelson had passed his security vetting.

So if KS is telling the truth then someone else must have lied to him.

Who lied?

Hes going to have to be very careful with this and keep a trail of what claims he is making...

Even if you vote Labour you are allowed to criticise the party's leadership. Debate is good, why mock it or shut it down? Go to North Korea, Iran (most Muslim countries in fact) or Russia if you can't stand debate.

I didn't pick up on that. Whoops...Keir should have got his timeline straight first.